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DR. PARKS 



PUBLISHED FOR PRIVATE 
CIRCULATION 



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PROLEGOMENON 

The writer, when not occupied in the last few years in 
trying to relieve suffering humanity— of its money— has dictated 
to various women at various times these notes, and they were 
usually taken down immediately on the machine. It is evident 
that the Apostle John and Madame De Remusat did not adopt 
his plan, as their styles are more diffuse. 

The writer, however, is fond of the French epigrammatic 
style of writing, which leaves something to the intelligence and 
imagination of the reader. 

You don't have to hammer an idea into a Boston man with 
a sledge hammer. But if he has gotten an idea into his head, 
it often takes a lever longer than Archimedes's to pry it out. 

The Author. 



The author requests that this book shall not be 
given to any paper or magazine for review nor 
exposed for sale in any public place. 



To his schoolmate and kinsman 

CHARLES NEWTON FESSENDEN 

a faithfiil man and fine classical scholar, this attempt 

to glean something from the past is 

affectionately inscribed by 

The Author 






^ 




Luther Parks 

Born, November ii, 1788 

Died, October 25, 1869 



DR. PARKS— HIS BOOK 

The late Dr. James Freeman Clarke thought that the 
Apostle John dictated to some of his friends, in his old age, 
the Fourth Gospel. Madame de Remusat wrote memoirs of the 
intimate life of Napoleon, which were published a hundred years 
after her death by her grandson, Paul de Remusat, senator. 

The writer believes that in sixty years of life he has had 
experiences of sufficient interest, and met some very distinguished 
people; so that, in humble imitation of the above mentioned 
writers, he records some notes which may be of interest later. 

He was born sixty years ago, in the South End of Boston, 
at Hardscrabble, as his grandfather playfully called Blackstone 
Square. His father was in the active practice of medicine there. 
It was expected that that would become the Court end of the 
town. About Franklin and Blackstone Squares are some hand- 
some houses, built on a large plan. Chester Park and Union 
Park were very handsome squares. Some of us remember the 
Deacon House farther south, with its Marie Antoinette furni- 
ture. The whole Back Bay region was then water. The writer 
has often skated where Trinity Church stands. When his father 
was a medical student the medical school was in Mason Street, 
where the school committee now meets; and as there was no 
dissection law, the bodies for the students were those of citizens 

[3] 



who had recently been buried in the graveyard on Washington 
Street, just south of Franklin Square. 

The decadence of the South End began when the writer 
left it, at the age of twelve, though he cannot consistently say 
that it was because he left it. The people moved to the new 
Back Bay district. 

His father, Luther Parks, Jr., was born in 1823. He told 
his son that his memory was distinct to the time that he was two 
years old, and that he went to 6 Chestnut Street at that age; 
therefore he went to 6 Chestnut Street in 1825. 

His father, when a boy, went to Dr. Leverett's school. 
Dr. Leverett was the author of the well-known Latin Lexicon. 
He, the son, had some conversation with Colonel Jeffries, who 
went to the same school at the same time. 

His father taught Latin in a young ladies' school in Boston 
after graduation from college. Mrs. Thomas Cushing was 
one of his pupils. Dr. Ernest Cushing is responsible for this 
statement. 

Julia Dale, who became his mother, lived opposite, the 
youngest of a family of children, who was adopted by Mr. and 
Mrs. William Hales. They were married by the Rev. Mr. 
Young, at the church on the Green in Summer Street, and a 
record of their marriage, in Mr, Young's beautiful handwriting, 
was, a few years ago, in charge of the Massachusetts Historical 
Society, as Dr. Samuel A. Green kindly let him examine it. 

[4] 



On their marriage his father started practice in Blackstone 
Square. 

When Luther Parks, Jr., was a child and was bad, his 
mother used to whip him with her busk. A busk was a piece 
of steel which women used to wear in their corsets. One of 
her friends was allowed to put on to him his first shirt. 
When he had arrived at manhood she always, when they met, 
reminded him of it, and he hated her cordially. 

The son's memory is distinct to the time he was three years 
old, when he went to Dublin and Holland. 

He remembers his grandmother very well. She came 
from Danvers, and had, probably, more aristocratic blood 
than any of us. She had a beautiful garden, and a grapevine 
against the house which bore grapes which could be picked from 
the piazza by the dining room ; a pear tree in the middle of the 
garden, which bore pears; also lilies of the valley, Solomon's 
seal, and old-fashioned brilliant flowers, peonies, and dahlias. 
The grapevine disappeared several years ago, but the pear 
tree, which became about fifty feet high, was cut down when 
Mr. Green remodeled the house. His grandmother had a white 
horse which she lent to Colonel Cowdin for a parade upon the 
Common. 

His father, on his second marriage, took the house in 
Chestnut Street. As there had to be a music room, he had a 
dining room made in the front of the house, below the level 

[5] 



of the street. It was very dismal, and he thinks it a step 
backwards. 

Seventy-five years ago the boys in Chestnut Street, when 
they counted off, used to say: 

"Philissy, Pholossy, Nicholas John, 
Queby, Quaby, Irish Mary. 
Stincklum, Stankelum, 
Johnnie Quo Buck!" 

When he was a boy at 6 Chestnut Street, that was a delight- 
ful neighborhood. Opposite were Mr. Patrick Grant and 
family. Next door a pretty girl, Miss Julia Cunningham, who 
married Bishop Lawrence. In the house which was next door 
and the steps corresponded with ours, Mr. Patrick Jackson. 

When General Devens, who was wounded in the foot at 
Chancellorsville, came home he was at his brother's house 
nearly opposite. 

He attended Dan Rice's circus on the Public Garden. 
There was a trick mule which Dan Rice offered a piece of 
gold as big as a cart wheel to any one who would ride. A 
Negro boy succeeded in remaining on it a long time by twist- 
ing his legs around the animal's neck and holding on tightly 
to his tail, although the mule turned somersaults. Whether the 
Negro got the piece of gold is unknown to the writer. One 
of the clowns sang a song: "Then up jumped Governor Wise 

[6] 



with his specs upon his eyes, and knocked him to the other side 
of Jordan, Oh!" To what historical fact the clown's song 
referred is unknown to the writer. 

He was sent to the State House to hear Governor Andrew 
make his plea for a license liquor law. A little man with curly 
hair, in full dress, with a white tie. He remembers well one 
argument. That the great cause of drunkenness in New Eng- 
land was the want of innocent, popular amusements. Today 
Keith's Theater probably prevents many people from drinking 
too much; and the Sunday concerts on the Common, in the 
same line. 

When Governor Andrew died his body was laid in state, 
covered with purple. It has since been discovered that "Tyrian 
purple" was red. Mr. Smith, of Washington, formerly of 
Boston, who has a classical museum there, is satisfied on this 
point — that "Tyrian purple" was red. 

In the Civil War, Governor Andrew oflered a commission 
as assistant surgeon in the Sixth Massachusetts Infantry to his 
father, and a very complimentary letter from Governor Andrew 
on the subject may be found in the "History of the Sixth 
Regiment in the Civil War," which was kindly lent to him 
by Dr. Robert Willard. He was also appointed a medical officer 
of Cobb's, afterwards Nims's, light battery, which the son often 
saw as a boy drilling on the Common. They were fine-looking 
men, as no one was accepted under six feet in height. The 

[7] 



battery went with General Banks's unfortunate expedition up 
the Red River. Inexperienced, they attempted to go through 
the woods without infantry fllankers, and the rebels came in 
and took their guns away from them ; but they were not of much 
use to the enemy, as their ammunition was a peculiar size of 
shrapnel made in South Boston, and after the limited supply 
was exhausted they could find no other to fit. A year or two 
ago he had the pleasure of a call upon Nims, who commanded 
the battery, and he was then a druggist, and a very old man, 
in Cambridge Street. His father did not, for domestic reasons, 
go to the war with the Sixth Regiment or with Nims's battery ; 
but early in the war, at the request of Governor Andrew, he 
went with Dr. Gay and others to the Peninsula, and rode from 
Yorktown to Williamsburg ; but he never received a commission 
from the state or government, so that he has not been eligible 
to the Loyal Legion. 

A few years ago he met in Philadelphia a gentleman named 
Smith, eighty years old. His father had been a soldier in the 
American Revolution at Valley Forge and Yorktown. His 
father told him that at the siege of Yorktown the American 
soldiers ran along the outside of the walls with ladders, 
suddenly put them up and climbed over. The night of the 
surrender the French ships in the river were illuminated with 
fireworks. 

Luther Parks wrote his son a letter which is preserved to 
describe his ride from Yorktown to Williamsburg. The ground 

[8] 



was strewn with mines which might explode on contact with 
the horses' shoes. There were inquiries for General McClellan 
— mounted officers rode back to find him, but he moved slowlj'. 
Dr. George Derby was seen operating under a tree exposed to 
fire. 

• • 

The son went to Yorktown in 1881 as a private in Com- 
pany B, Independent Corps Cadets. He was sentry on the 
beach, and once General Arthur, the then President of the 
United States, passed within a few yards of him, and the soldier 
twice presented arms to the President. The last evening the 
sunset was fine, and a salute was fired from the men-of-war 
in the river — old wooden ships, the Trenton flagship, the Alert, 
and Alliance. It was a magnificent sight, never to be forgotten. 

At Yorktown the Corps was halted at the left of the grand 
stand and Colonel Edmands chafed at the inaction. The 
Virginia cadets had passed and there was a gap in the column. 
An officer called out, " Colonel, if your men are ready you may 
march past." Instantly Colonel Edmands gave the proper 
orders. 

On the steamer Empire State the writer was a sentry in 
the cabin. His orders were, " No smoking." The Commander- 
in-Chief, Governor Long, sat down in an armchair, wrapped 
his cloak around him, and started to enjoy a postprandial 
smoke. The sentry saluted and told him "it was against orders 
to smoke in the cabin." The governor deserves the highest 
praise for the promptness and good temper with which he threw 
his cigar away. 

[9] 



In the Civil War General Grant was in command of the 
whole United States Army, He went on to a wharf to enjoy 
an after-dinner cigar. The sentry told him it was "against 
orders to smoke on the wharf." He threw his cigar away. The 
cases are exactly parallel. 

At the age of about fifteen he went to Labrador on the 
schooner Lilla Rich, eighty-two tons burden. He was gone 
just two months, and had, for a boy, a very eventful trip. He 
had some good trout fishing in Nova Scotia; he walked down 
the coal mines in Cape Breton; he was lowered down one in 
a bucket; he shot birds in the Magdalen Islands in the Gulf 
of St. Lawrence; he saw about two hundred icebergs in a trip 
through the Strait of Belle Isle. At Rigolette, the farthest 
point north, he saw some Labrador Indians of colossal size, 
and shook hands with some of them at the blacksmith's shop. 
The writer has seen the Jersey mosquito in former times, but 
he is a baby compared to the Labrador insect. It was said 
that a criminal was stripped of his clothes and tied to a tree, 
and the mosquitoes did the rest. He paddled about the harbor 
in an Eskimo kyak, and he dug up an Eskimo skull and femur 
and brought them to Boston. He waited till a fog settled 
down to rob the grave. These he exhibited to the Boston 
Society of Natural History, on the introduction of Professor 
Jeffries Wyman. 

Their pilot along the coast was Johnny Williams, who had 
deserted from the British Navy, settled in Labrador, married 
an Eskimo woman, and had a lot of half-breed daughters, 

[10] 



whose chief occupation seemed to be to make bags of various 
sorts with bird skins sewed together. There was no trust- 
worthy chart of the coast later than one made like Captain 
Cook's, who discovered the Hawaiian Islands. He well re- 
members Battle Harbor, where recently Lieutenant Com- 
mander Peary stopped on his return from the Pole, and where 
we began to hear from him. 

Dr. Wyman, who had measured the internal capacity of 
the skull with dried peas and taken measurements, said to the 
Society that that skull alone satisfied him that the Eskimo 
was a Mongolian. The writer had these as ornaments in 
his room in Gray's Hall, Harvard College. He afterwards 
presented them to the Peabody Museum, at the solicitation of 
Dr. Wyman. The sailors knew he had the skull of an Eskimo 
aboard, and there was much grumbling and fear of disaster. 
When in the Gulf of St. Lawrence there were mutterings 
among the crew, as the weather became bad, "that they would 
throw the boy's skull and cross-bone overboard and him with 
them if the weather stayed bad." He had robbed the grave 
for strictly scientific purpose, but after all he was only a boy 
of fifteen. The weather grew worse and worse, and his imagi- 
nation ran riot as to what might happen. Perhaps the sailors 
were right, the Eskimo's head might cause disaster to all hands. 
When kind Captain Dodge laid a hand on his arm as he was 
asleep and said, "Come, boy, you must give us a hand now," 
he started up and knew that danger had come. 

He was told a story about the Indians at Rigolette. In 
the fall they went up the Northwest River to hunt. On their 

[II] 



return an old man was missing. On inquiry they said they 
had found that he did not do his share of the work, so a com- 
mittee of one was appointed to hit him on the head and push 
him overboard. 

After we had passed through the Strait of Belle Isle, on 
the return trip, we were nearly wrecked on the lee shore, on the 
coast of Newfoundland. Our jib broke loose from its sheet, 
as it was torn near the bottom, and floated in the air in front 
of the vessel. The mate, a tall man, ran out on the jib boom 
and with his long legs twined around the boom gathered it in. 
In his work he was several times submerged, but when he came 
out of the water he went to work again. Those were parlous 
times. 

North of Belle Isle the sun did not set till about ten o'clock. 
The boy used to spend half the night on deck to watch the 
Aurora Borealis. 

Once he climbed the rigging to the crosstrees. He went 
up easily enough, but had difficulty about coming down, for he 
had been lashed to the rigging. It was the reverse of the 
Facilts descensus Averni ; sed revertarij hie labor hoc opus est. 

What color is an iceberg? White? Not when the sun 
shines. Then it is blue and green and all colors. The berg 
melts and water runs down in rivulets. The sunlight is 
refracted by the water and the berg is resplendent. 

• • 

About twelve years after graduation in medicine he went 
to Vienna to perfect himself in his profession. He had a letter 
of introduction to Professor Fuchs. The first thing to do 

[12] 



was to familiarize himself with the sound of German, and this 
was accomplished easily by attendance on the lectures of that 
grand old North German, Robert Ultzmann, who spoke 
very slowly. Afterward he spent most of his time in the 
Krankenhaus. He took mostly practical courses, Bergmeister 
gave a course on operations on the eye, and this the writer 
found so valuable that he took it twice over. Konigstein gave 
a course in English on the ophthalmoscope. He also attended 
various other courses on the eye and a variety of other 
subjects. 

If, when he returned to Boston, he had devoted himself 
exclusively to practice, he might have made some money, or 
better, he should have settled in a less conservative and more 
live place. He had been urged to go to Buffalo, and of course 
New York is the metropolis. 

In answer to a question which has often been asked him, 
he honestly believes that at that time no such practical, thor- 
ough courses on operations on the eye could be obtained any- 
where in this country. He was made to do his cataracts and 
iridectomies over and over again, with attention to the minutest 
detail, until Klein or Bergmeister was satisfied that he was 
competent to perform them properly. Bergmeister had some 
excellent and ingenious plastic operations, one of which the 
author practiced on an Italian in Boston who had lost an eye 
by a blast. The author made him an entirely new upper 
lid, but the Italian was not satisfied, as it did not wink as 
he expected. However, it covered up an unsightly cavity. 
He had a very excellent little course on bacteriology with 

[13] 



Weichselbaum. He saw Albert do some surgery, but the 
surgical courses were very advanced. 

After having worked very hard all winter, in the spring 
he ran up to Dresden for the particular purpose to see the 
Sistine Madonna. He also saw the crown jewels of Saxony. 

He had constantly in mind, when in Dresden, that his late 
father had been presented at the court of Saxony. His costume 
had been long white stockings, red garters, and, he thinks, a 
sword, which were required by etiquette for the occasion. The 
son owns the first two mentioned articles, which were sent 
home to him. 

He found very advanced work on the eye in Paris. Landolt 
was a mathematician and an excellent operator. De Wecker 
did advanced work, but Dr. Meyer was the writer's special 
patron, as Dr. Fuchs had been in Vienna, and the writer spent 
many hours at his Maison de Sante. 

In Vienna he saw something of royalty. He often saw 
the emperor, Franz Joseph, and received a bow from him on 
one occasion. At the unveiling of the statue of Maria Theresia, 
which took place out of doors, he saw the whole Austrian 
Court out in their fine clothes. He saw the unhappy Crown 
Prince then and on other occasions. The tragedy connected 
with him occurred soon after he left Vienna for Paris, but the 
writer was still in communication with Vienna. The first report 
was that he had been killed by an infuriated gamekeeper whose 
daughter he had led astray. All sorts of reports were current, 
but the old Emperor had merely to express a wish that there 
should be no further discussion of the subject and all discussion 

[14] 



immediately ceased. He believes the true story to have been 
told in "The Martyrdom of an Empress," that the Crown 
Prince had a stormy interview with his father at the palace, 
which lasted nearly all night, in which the old man insisted 
that he must give up the woman he wished to marry, Marie 
Vetsera, as she was his sister. It was a case of double 
suicide. 

He saw a review, near Vienna, of twenty thousand Austrian 
troops, the best troops in Europe on parade, but as history 
shows they have never succeeded in any of their wars. 

Austria is the most Catholic of all Catholic countries he 
has ever been in, not excepting Italy or France. Many of the 
soldiers had sprigs of evergreen (the tips in three parts, to repre- 
sent the Trinity) in their rifles. 

He had the pleasure of attending at the palace the ceremony 
of the foot-washing, when the emperor is supposed to humble 
himself every year by washing the feet of twelve old men and 
women; but it was only a ceremony. 

He was very much struck by the uniform of the Hungarian 
Guards, a leopard skin over their bare shoulders; and he saw 
among them the Count Hunyadi, a very fierce-looking man. 

He saw the Crown Prince of Germany ride into Vienna 
in a barouche, with one foot on the step to show his eager- 
ness to embrace the Crown Prince of Austria. He probably 
kissed him on both cheeks. It was said at the time that the 
Crown Prince of Germany confided to the Crown Prince of 
Austria that when he became emperor he intended to follow 
the policy of Frederick the Great; and that the Crown Prince 

[15] 



of Austria reminded him that the policy of Frederick the Great 
had been to crush Austria. 

He spent two winters in Paris, where he studied medicine; 
but the second winter was there particularly to perfect himself 
in the ability to speak French. He saw somewhat of the Army. 
He saw a review near Paris. When he was in Paris there were 
two marshals, Canrobert and Bazaine. Bazaine was in Mexico 
with the French. Canrobert, whom he saw, was over ninety 
years old, and had a distinguished military bearing, though his 
moustache drooped at the corners. 

He met a general at his little hotel who had been under 
Bazaine in Mexico. He was a man of great learning and 
lectured on Egyptology at the Louvre. He had a chateau in 
France, and was a very delightful companion. 

The first time he went to France, on his way to Vienna, 
he went from New York to Bordeaux, and sailed up the 
Garonne and the Gironde Rivers in an old Hudson River 
steamboat, which was very interesting, past medieval chateaux 
and curious country scenes. Very few Americans visit Bor- 
deaux, and he met there an American consul who was very glad 
to see him. He had lost a leg at Gettysburg, under General 
Sickles. 

Once, in Paris, he saw about a dozen balloons floating in the 
air, free. The attention of the crowd was attracted to one of 
them, and a man in the crowd said, "C'est une Americaine.'* 
From under one of the balloons hung by one arm, from a 
trapeze, a woman. She was Leona Dare, who had been shot 
out of a catapult in Barnum's Circus. 

[i6] 



His father, who was in favor of the abolition of slavery 
and a free-soiler, was an agent of the underground railway. 
Mrs. Cruft told him that his father was interested in a fugitive 
slave, a certain Mrs. Smith, and she was afraid that the owners 
would come North and claim her; but his father told her that 
if they came he would take her in his carriage and put her in 
a place of safety. 

When in Philadelphia the son served a short time as assistant 
in the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane, and Dr. Kirkbride 
was very much pleased when told that his father had been an 
agent of the underground railway, as he himself had also been 
one. Dr. Kirkbride had one of the most spiritual characters 
that he has ever known. 

His experience in the Philadelphia Hospital, Blockley, was 
extremely interesting for a young man. There were about 
three thousand inmates, and the van used to go through the city 
picking up all stray people. The young doctors would classify 
them as they came in ; if they were well, they were made to dig 
in the garden, but if ill, they were sent to proper wards. There 
were no trained nurses in those days. The hospital was ruled 
over by a Board of Guardians, many of whom were dishonest; 
and their superintendent, Phipps, was sent to Moyamensing 
Prison. At one time they discovered that, though they ordered 
liquors for the patients, they never received them, but that they 
were sold and the proceeds divided among the nurses. Although 
aseptic methods had not come in, they had valuable experiences 
there. The most startling experience that he ever had in his 
practice was when, as a young man, he was called up one night 

[17] 



to a man who was bleeding from the nose. His pillow was a 
mass of blood, and the sight ghastly for a young man. He 
plugged his nose with a Bellocq canula and stopped the hemor- 
rhage, but as he had a bad heart disease, of course he had another 
hemorrhage in which he died. Nurse Peterman, who made for 
the doctors porter sangaree, has, he supposes, long since passed 
away. 

At one time he and his friend. Dr. John Keating, attended 
three women in confinement. Those were wild old days in 
Blockley Hospital. 

Some years ago his friend, Dr. Benjamin S. Shaw, asked 
him to go with him to the old Music Hall to see Professor 
Graham Bell, who was to talk the length of Music Hall on a 
wire. He was incredulous that Dr. Bell could do such a thing, 
but nevertheless went. Since then he has talked on a wire some 
hundreds of miles. 

On the steamer to Havre he met General Berdan, who 
invented Berdan's rifle and commanded Berdan's sharp-shooters 
in the Civil War. He was at Gettysburg, and he told him 
that story of how a man who was shot through both legs, and 
dying, begged him to give him another shot at them before he 
died on the field. General Berdan's daughter was the wife 
of the novelist Marion Crawford. 

He went to England one winter as surgeon of the Warren 
steamship Minnesota, Captain Burwell. When he left East 

[i8] 



Boston it was extremely cold, and the first night on board in the 
surgery, a little room down forward, was far from comfort- 
able. His port was not screwed up tightly and the water came 
in and drenched him in his berth. The coalheavers had come 
aboard, mostly drunk, Saturday afternoon, and the next morn- 
ing they all appeared at the surgery and asked for black- 
draught. He had not known what black-draught was, but on 
consultation of the books he discovered that it was salts and 
senna. He gave it to them in liberal doses and they thought 
he was a fine doctor. Afterwards Captain Burwell gave him 
a cabin aft, and when they reached the Gulf Stream it was 
warm and pleasant. He had a very smooth passage in January 
to Liverpool, which occupied eleven days. He had few patients. 
One of them was a baby who was tongue-tied, and he was 
anxious as a young doctor to operate, but the mother would 
not consent. He inquired the sex of the child, and repeated 
to the mother Professor Gross's familiar joke that if it was a 
girl-baby it need not be operated on, it would work loose; but 
if it was a boy an operation was necessary. 

There were some Algerines aboard who had escaped from 
the Penal College at Cayenne. They had been taken off by 
a Yankee skipper and brought to Boston, but the authorities 
would not let them land, but put them on our steamer to be 
sent to England, and ultimately to France. They were in the 
steerage and they suffered horribly from chillblains. They laid 
in the straw without blankets, as they had none and he failed 
to get any for them from the captain or purser. They were 
all branded on the cheek, and as they gathered around the 

[19] 



smokestacks to warm themselves they pulled their shawls, 
which they carried over their heads, over that side of the cheek 
to conceal the brands from view. 

When he was in the dispensary at the North End of Boston 
he attended the wake of one of his patients, which appealed to 
his sense of humor. There was the tobacco and the pipes 
on the table for the friends. The widow rocked to and fro 
and was very demonstrative in her grief. The friends bowed 
and courtesied to the corpse as they came in, and the whole 
scene was almost an exact reproduction of the wake scene in 
the " Shaughraun." He considers the wake scene in the 
"Shaughraun" one of the best bits of Irish humor in all the 
comedies with which he is familiar; and the wittiest speech of 
all was when Conn, the Shaughraun, sits up in his coffin and 
says, "Ah! the divil must be proud of you, Corrie Kinchella." 

He had the pleasure to meet Boucicault at the Boston 
Museum, in Mrs. Vincent's dressing room. She introduced 
the two men. It was during a matinee. Boucicault said: 
"Doctor, you have chosen an unfortunate afternoon; the audi- 
ence hasn't waked up yet. Every actor knows exactly when 
an audience begins to be in sympathy with him; until that 
moment to act is a hard task; after that it is easy." 

Mr. Boucicault as a playwright was a plagiarist. Mrs. Vin- 
cent told the writer that when, as a young woman, she acted 
with him in the old country, that one day they rehearsed their 
parts. She studied her part from a printed book; the other 
actors from manuscript which Boucicault had given them. 

[20] 



Boucicault asked her what she was doing with that book; she 
replied that it was easier to study print than manuscript, and 
that he had taken his play from an old play, "The Liar." He 
had stolen pretty near the whole play. In spite of this fault 
he was, however, a delightful man to meet. 

Mrs. Vincent's maiden name was Mary Anne Farley. 

Who has forgotten the German doorkeeper at the Boston 
Museum, with the schmiss on his face? Mrs. Vincent told the 
writer a good story about him which the writer thinks advisable 
not to print. But he can relate it on application. 

When at Luzern he lived opposite a house where the 
morganatic widow of the Emperor Alexander of Russia lived. 
She used to dine in the garden, and the man-servant who waited 
upon her always addressed her as "Princesse." She had a son 
constantly under the tutelage of Dr. . 

When he was in Paris he visited a mushroom cave outside 
the Barrier, at Mont Rouge. He descended a ladder about 
forty feet. He had a stout cane. The farmer, a big, strong 
man, told him to leave it outside, which he did. It would not 
do for an Anglo-Saxon to show fear of a Frenchman. But he 
might easily have not come out of the cave alive. And the 
world would never have known what had become of him. 

In Paris he lived opposite the great Ricord. 

The professor was really an American. When he died he 
was within a few months of being ninety years old. 

[21] 



The writer visited him sur son lit de mort. He laid on 
the bed in his evening clothes, surrounded by six candles which 
rose from the floor to the height of several feet. Flowers were 
strewn on the bed. His great-grandchildren were playing about 
in the room. 

He went out to the Pacific coast to make his fortune. 
When at Santa Barbara he was invited to go off on the Coast 
Survey steamer Mc Arthur, which was triangulating the coast. 
At San Bernardino Captain Leutze gave the doctor a leave of 
absence of a week, and the writer took his place. He went 
ashore with a young officer to climb a hill and put a signal 
on the top for the triangulation. When most up the hill they 
began to slide, and they might have slid two or three hundred 
feet if a sailor had not climbed the side of the hill like a 
cat and let a line down to them. The last he heard of the 
Mc Arthur she had been at the bottom of the sea in San Fran- 
cisco harbor ; but she was brought up. 

When in San Francisco the Bannock Indians in the lava 
beds of Oregon broke out into rebellion. He appealed to 
Colonel Keaney, medical director of the Pacific coast, for a job. 
He promised to send him off as contract surgeon, with a horse 
and a hundred dollars a month for the war. The colonel said 
there was not much fight in those Indians, and all he would 
have to do would be to ride around, and he might buy some 
trophies; but the Princess Sarah Winnemucca, an educated 
woman, persuaded the Indians not to fight, and he was much 
disappointed. O the trouble the w^omen do make! Sarah 

[22] 



Winnemucca and Sarah ; but the white woman made a 

great deal worse trouble than the red one. 

When the Spanish War broke out he was in Washington, 
and again became very anxious to serve in a military capacity. 
He offered his services to General Sternberg, whom he met at 
the Cosmos Club, both before the war broke out and after- 
wards, and he wrote from Philadelphia to urge his suit. There 
was one thing that he didn't do, he didn't apply to his Con- 
gressman, or use any political influence, and he didn't get the 
job which he coveted very much, as he was anxious to serve 
his country. 

Up to as late as the time that he was in college there was 
a well of sweet water in the back shed at 6 Chestnut Street, 
about two-thirds of the way down. He thinks he could put 
his foot on the exact spot. All the wells in Chestnut Street, 
the one at No. 6, the one at Jerry Abbott's house opposite, the 
one at Mr. Coolidge's house (low down in Chestnut Street), 
were closed by order of the Board of Health. Mr. Gay, who 
bought Jerry Abbott's house, tells him that now in his deed is 
a provision which permits his back neighbors to use his well, 
although the well has been closed. 

By the way, Professor John C. Dalton, of New York, came 
to Boston to see his father. As his father was not in, he in- 
quired for Mrs. Parks, who came down to see Professor Dalton. 
He did not introduce himself, but said abruptly, "Those trees 
in front of the house ought to be cut down ; they make the 

[23] 



house too damp." That must have happened about 1870, and 
those trees have not yet been cut down. 

Recently Mrs. Kehew told him that her house, 27A, nearly 
opposite Spruce Street, was built about one hundred years ago. 
Bulfinch was the architect. 

He thinks the house occupied by Dr. J. Baxter Upham is 
the one now occupied as a boarding house. A few years ago 
this house had wall paper representing in large patterns human 
figures, if not historical scenes; at any rate, it was interesting 
wall paper. What has become of it? 

The best sermon the writer ever heard James Freeman 
Clarke preach was on the text, "Muzzle not the ox that 
treadeth out the corn." 

He told the writer that it was known that Christopher 
Columbus had been in Iceland — three miles from a monastery 
where records were kept of the voyages of the Northmen to 
America. 

He considers it a great privilege that he grew up under 
the personal counsel and religious instruction of James Free- 
man Clarke. Among the other people in Boston who had a 
great influence upon his life, though some years later, was 
Mrs. J. R. Vincent, the actress at the Boston Museum, with 
whom he had his office the last two years of her life, and was 
with her at her deathbed. He had the privilege of bringing 
these two noble characters together. While living with 
Mrs. Vincent he had the privilege of meeting the wonderful 
comedian, William Warren, although, contrary to general be- 

[24] 



lief, they were not personal friends. Warren was an atheist; 
Mrs. Vincent, on the contrary, a very strong churchwoman ; 
which was the only reason why she had no liking for William 
Warren. She admired him extremely as an actor. Mrs. Vin- 
cent knew the English language perfectly, and she knew nothing 
whatever of any other language. The writer received from her 
some valuable training in the pronunciation of English; but, 
best of all, he got from her some of her wonderful regard for 
the lower animals, which she carried farther than any one with 
whom he has had acquaintance. 

Mrs. Vincent told him that "The Rivals" was the finest 
comedy in the English language. 

After Mrs. Vincent's death the Vincent Memorial Hospital 
was founded, chiefly through the instrumentality of one earnest 
lady, not primarily for women patients, but as a hospital for 
women doctors. She had a positive hatred of women as 
doctors, and the writer thinks that a hospital for women 
singularly unfortunate as a memorial for Mrs. Vincent. If 
it had been a hospital for disabled firemen, whom she loved, 
or for horses or dogs, it would have been more appropriate. 

After having left college, by the advice of Professor Jeffries 
Wyman, he studied chemistry with Dr. Gibbs in the Lawrence 
Scientific School, in preparation for the study of medicine. 

Some years before, Dr. Gibbs and one Charles W. Eliot 
were rivals for the chair of chemistry in the Scientific School, 
and Dr. Gibbs won. When Eliot became president of the 
University he never visited the Scientific School officially, but 

[25] 



summoned Dr. Gibbs over to University Hall. Probably 
Dr. Gibbs felt the indignity. It is certain that we young men 
did. Dr. Gibbs vi^as a man of great personal dignity. 

His grandfather had two stories which he delighted to 
tell about Peter Harvey, who took care of Daniel Webster 
when drunk and lent him money. He, Peter Harvey, was a 
very stout man and had an enormous thigh and leg. He went 
to Washington to give President Lincoln advice as to his (the 
President's) policy. Lincoln listened to him attentively, and 
when he had finished slapped his (Peter Harvey's) thigh 
and said, "By George! Mr. Harvey, your leg is most as big 
as mine." 

There was a man named Cheatham who had his office in 
the neighborhood of the writer's grandfather's ofKce. Peter 
Harvey had his also in the same neighborhood. His grand- 
father had had some dealing with Peter Harvey, and the latter 
felt that he had not been fairly treated, though Luther Parks 
was a very honest man. One day a man stopped at Harvey's 
office to inquire for Mr. Cheatham, and Harvey directed him 
to Luther Parks'. He recognized at once who had done it. 
He said it was the only bright thing he ever knew Peter Harvey 
to do. 

Lieutenant Dale was born in the Arsenal grounds in 
Springfield, Massachusetts. 

Lieutenant John Blake Dale was second in command of 
the United States Exploring Expedition to the Dead Sea 

[26] 



and the Jordan, and artist of the expedition. The illustrations 
in Lynch 's book are from his (Dale's) pencil. 

He would have been in command, but he was thought to 
be too young. He left two sons, William Hales Dale and 
John. Their guardians were Luther Parks and Eben Dale. 
When but eighteen years of age, Johnnie began to spit blood, 
and Dr. Parks put him aboard the Fleetwood, Captain Dale, 
of Gloucester, bound round Cape Horn. The writer well 
remembers the ship in Boston Harbor, its rigging covered with 
ice and snow. She was lost ofF the coast of Patagonia, and 
was said to have struck an iceberg in the night. One boatload 
only reached the shore. Johnnie Dale was lost. 

Eben Dale employed detectives to question these sailors in 
New York to learn if there had been foul play. But they held 
consistently to their story — that the vessel had struck an ice- 
berg in the night. The detectives lived with them and drank 
with them. 

What a noble man old Eben Dale was! 

The log of Lieutenant Dale is in several volumes in the 
Massachusetts Historic Genealogical Society. 

He was two weeks on a desert island in the Southern 
Ocean, and his drinking cup was a shell. Wilkes ordered him 
ashore in charge of a boat to get water, with orders to return 
at once. Dale thought the surf too heavy and waited. Wilkes 
sailed away and did not return for a fortnight. When Dale 
came aboard he was put under arrest. This, he wrote, was 
"a welcome with a vengeance." Wilkes afterwards admitted 
that his delay was due to inexperience. 

[27] 




"that boy '' 



There was not any relationship between Eben Dale, of 
Gloucester, and William H. Dale, though William was inti- 
mate with Eben and Theron Dale. Julia Dale was not legally 
adopted by William Hales and his wife. Julia Dale was the 
youngest of a large family of children — twelve. 

When he was a boy at Miles's Military School at Brattle- 
boro, Vermont, he was a corporal. When he passed his vaca- 
tions at 6 Chestnut Street his father required him to wear his 
uniform with his red chevrons. It was war time and he was 
much in evidence in the street. 

Thirty or forty years later he was presented to Mrs. Julia 
Ward Howe. She asked at once, in her epigrammatic way, 
"Are you that boy?" He admitted that he was. 

He asked Mrs. Julia Ward Howe if the lines in the 
Battle Hymn of the Republic, "In the beauty of the lilies 
Christ was born across the sea," had any special reference. 
She said it was merely a figure of speech. 

At another time he asked her how she acquired her beautiful 
speaking voice. She replied that as a girl the family used to 
read aloud evenings. 

On one occasion Governor Andrew visited Mrs. Howe at 
her house in Chestnut Street. As housekeeping was not her 
strong suit, she sent to Mrs. Parks to borrow some sheets for 
His Excellency to sleep in. His father declared that he was 
going, when they were sent back, to cut them up into pocket 
handkerchiefs for the family as souvenirs of the governor. 

[28] 



At Brattleboro the boys had buttons with the letter M. 
Some town boy said : 

"Miles's mighty mean militia, 
Marching Monkeys, 
Military Mules." 

As a boy he knew a dear old gentleman, Henry Burroughs, 
more than eighty years old. He remembered well the War 
of 1812. He said that the boys on the Common — the boys 
when they felt jolly — "used to throw up their caps and then 
their wigs." The writer believes it is a historical fact that 
boys in Boston in the early part of the nineteenth century 
wore wigs. 

There used to be a class of bores, now nearly or wholly 
extinct, who had seen Taglioni dance. None had ever danced 
like Taglioni. None would ever again dance like Taglioni, 
in their opinion. 

The writer may be tiresome in his belief that there never 
was a place like old Chestnut Street. Eben Dale, Dr. Lothrop, 
Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, Richard H. Dana lived there. The 
automobile has done much to ruin it. 

« • • 

Dr. Lothrop was the last chaplain of the First Corps of 
Cadets, and enjoyed the dinner of the Corps at the Parker 
House. He looked more like a fox-hunting, Irish gentleman 
than a minister of Brattle Street Church. 

[29] 



Dr. B. Joy Jeffries's grandfather crossed the British 
Channel from France to England in a balloon. He went as 
a passenger, having signed a written agreement to jump into 
the sea if it became necessary to lighten the load. As they 
neared England there was danger that they would strike the 
chalk cHfifs. Jeffries began to undress, preparatory to jump- 
ing; but the balloon took, fortunately, an upward turn and 
he remained. 

One hundred years later Dr. Jeffries celebrated the event 
at his grandfather's request by a reception at 15 Chestnut 
Street. The barometer and other instruments carried and the 
clothes worn by Jeffries were shown. The writer was one of 
the guests and had the honor, at the request of Dr. Jeffries, 
to explain to Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes the various objects 
of interest shown. 

In one hundred years there had been no improvement in 
the art of ballooning. 

Dr. Henry W. Williams told Dr. Luther Parks that 
artists, to denote the expression of piety, make the eyes con- 
verge slightly as well as look upward. 

George Burroughs was a short time in Harvard College 
and then went to West Point. He was third in his class and 
entered the Engineer Corps. He graduated in 1861 just in 
time to go into the Civil War. He was at Chattanooga and 
Nashville. At the former he seized a saber and rushed into 
the fight, which an engineer officer should not do. He became 

[30] 



a major. He was on duty in Boston, He built the break- 
water at Provincetown and had his first independent command 
as inspector of a lighthouse district. 

George Burroughs was known at the Academy and in the 
Army by his classmates as "Los." At West Point, in the 
Spanish class, they had read about "Los Burros" — the rabbit. 
The present General MacKenzie of the Engineer Corps was 
one of his classmates. The former General U. S. Grant said 
of him many years ago that he was the brightest young man in 
the Army. 

When George Burroughs died, the writer was sent by his 
father to announce the sad event to General Foster. He found 
the general at home in the second-story front room of a house 
in Franklin Square, opposite Washington Street. 

He said to the general, "Major Burroughs is dead, sir." 
And the general 'replied, "The devil you say." That was all. 

He was a brave and brilliant officer. 

George Burroughs told a story of something that happened 
at West Point. A boy took a loaded shell to the point, put it 
between his knees and hammered it on a rock. Soon there was 
nothing left of the boy. This is true history. 

In his time, the old English pronunciation of Latin went 
out and the new Continental came in. With President Eliot 
came in the elective system, which the writer believes is not 
an unmitigated blessing. Many of the students selected such 
courses as would enable them to get their degree with the least 
amount of study; and it is a question if the old iron-bound 

[31] 




THK FINTSHEn PRODUCT 



course did not produce better scholarship, though it may not 
have prepared men as well for the special schools. There used 
to be families of scholars. Horace Binney Sargent, Lucius 
Manlius Sargent and the Morisons, Charles Sumner, Charle- 
magne Tower were all scholars. The degrees ought to be 
conferred, as formerly, in Latin, which has always been the 
language of scholars. President Eliot has conferred them in 
English, the great mercantile language. 

What Boston boy has forgotten the enormous lobsters 
which were exposed for sale in wheelbarrows in front of the 
Boylston Market? They were red and were fully eighteen 
inches long. The men used to go about with the barrows and 
cry, "Buy a lob — lob — lob. Buy a lob." 

Captain Jackson says that Mr. Thomas Gaffield is authority 
for the statement that manganese causes the purple color in the 
glass on the south side of Beacon Street. 



[32] 



juN 2i 19H 



■m- 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



riJN 27 1*5 'I 



